Tentative Justification In The Camp

TENTATIVE JUSTIFICATION IN THE CAMP - PT. 1963 - Page 45

(5) Question: Where do either Bro. Russell or Bro. Johnson teach that Tentative Justification ever has been—or ever will be—represented in the Camp, as you now teach it with respect to your Campers Consecrated?

Answer: Here again is a question that anyone who regularly reads and understands THE PRESENT TRUTH would not need to ask, for the P.T. has given much evidence to this effect. It has repeatedly called attention to Bro. Russell's teaching that tentative justification precedes consecration and that consecration is always in order, that "nothing short of full consecration will ever be proper"; he stated also that "full consecration will be required of those who would live and enjoy the blessings of the Millennial Age—nothing short of it" (Z 1113, par. 6; 5761, col. 2; F 156). Thus he showed that in the end of the Age, after the "readjustment" would take place and those tentatively-justified ones who did not go on to consecration would be remanded to the Camp, there would be tentative justification; however, it would be pictured, not in the Court, but in the Camp. In P '59, p. 41, we set forth clearly his teaching on tentative justification being pictured in the Camp after the Gate to the Court is forever closed, that it would operate even in the Millennial Age (it will operate then in the sense of a tentative actual justification), that "the world might then be said to be tentatively justified" (Z 5959, par. 6), and that "every one of that time who will be in the right way, and seeking to be in harmony with the Lord, will be said to be tentatively justified" (Ques. Book, p. 402, bottom). Yet in the face of all this J.J.H. asks where Bro. Russell ever taught that tentative justification ever has been—or ever will be—represented in the Camp! Indeed, none is so blind as he who will not see.

Bro. Johnson also taught that consecration is always in order (E 4, p. 420), and that tentative justification (in its pre-restitution sense—tentative faith justification, for the pre-Millennial seed, including the quasi-elect) would operate "until restitution begins" (E 4, p. 346; P '59, pp. 40, 41)—but not "for Gospel-Age purposes" after 1954, when the Youthful Worthy call would end (E 10, p. 114; E 11, pp. 473, 494, top) and when the Great Company's attestatorial work of building up the Epiphany Camp would begin (P '54, pp. 57, 58), by their (the Youthful Worthies co-operating) witnessing to those outside the Court, "whereby the Epiphany Camp, which will consist of the loyal justified [italics ours] and the converted loyal Jews ['Gentile and Jewish believers'—E 9, p. 156], by the Kingdom witness will be constructed" (E 10, p. 672; comp. E 14, p. 266). He showed that the antitypical Levites in the Epiphany Court would after their cleansing witness to those in the Epiphany Camp, that they would hold up the Curtain (which "represents Christ as Savior and King") "to the view of all in the Camp" (E 5, p. 420; T 114; see also P '58, pp. 60, 61; '63, pp. 28-30).

It would seem that the questioner, who in his sifting activities opposes the teachings of Bro. Russell and Bro. Johnson on tentative justification ever being represented in the Camp (just as J.F. Rutherford from another standpoint opposed Bro. Russell's teachings on tentative justification—E 4, pp. 336-358; E 6, pp. 165-170, 189-204), would make them both appear ridiculous, as false prophets: Bro. Russell, because he claimed that tentative justification will be pictured even in the Millennial Camp; and Bro. Johnson also, because he taught that tentative justification would operate "until restitution begins," and that after 1954, in the Great Company's Attestatorial Service, the antitypical Levites in the Epiphany Court would hold up the Curtain, "Christ as Savior and King," "to the view of all in the Camp," to thus build up the Camp—but, as J.J.H. would have it, holding it up fruitlessly, without winning any to justification, without even one person in the Camp ever coming to believe in Jesus as Savior and King, and therefore without any Epiphany Camp thus being built up at all, but consisting only of those rejected from the Court.